Demand Forecasting Model for Emergent Manufacturing

Emergence of outsourcing and global partnerships has driven the need for emergent manufacturing. Emergent manufacturing is a concept and mechanism that allows manufacturing based organizations to mitigate the risk of outsourcing their manufacturing functions. The implementation of emergent manufacturing is on a rise and yet many industrial facilities have to decide when to switch to emergent manufacturing.

To achieve a strategic fit of emergent manufacturing with the existing manufacturing facilities is the current need of the Industry. There is a strong need to develop a body of literature and models specifically for this task.

This thesis aims to develop a model to better forecast the demand of emergent manufacturing. This is achieved by designing mathematical, simulation and statistical models to predict the demand of emergent manufacturing. This new proposed model would develop a guide line to implement, manage and sustain emergent manufacturing in today‟s aggressively outsourcing world, where manufacturing facilities are rapidly being downsized to cut down operational costs.